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ONDCP

Office of National Grub Control Policy

Milo Bryant at the Colorado Springs Gazette is so impressed with what the Drug Czar has accomplished, he wants to create a similar office to stop people from being so damned fat:
The country needs somebody qualified to help whip our butts into shape. That somebody would have the power to command, influence and draw resources from various aspects of the government to help us get in better shape.

This person, with our help, would lay out a comprehensive plan to help fight childhood obesity and, on a grander scale, obesity in general.

The United States needs an obesity czar, akin to John P. Walters, the director of the Office of the National Drug Control Policy — our drug czar.
Um, the drug war attacks people. It's unscrupulous. We need the government to attack less people, not more. I'm not sure Milo Bryant really understands what ONDCP advocates. Basically, it's a two-pronged approach:

1. Arrest as many people as possible
2. Exaggerate the government's role in activities other than arresting people

I'm just not sure any of this would carry over very well into the arena of trying to make people healthy. Would store clerks be deputized to identify customers suspected of planning unhealthy meals by flagging suspicious combinations of ingredients? Would students be subject to random non-punitive "weigh-ins," including parental notification and referral to a weight-reduction counselor? Would children found in possession of unapproved foods be denied access to federally subsidized athletic programs?

Let's get real. Childhood obesity is probably caused by the drug war somehow, so if we really want to make a difference, we must attack the problem at its roots. It's time these losers started worrying more about what comes out of their mouths than what goes into ours.

Feds Raid Wheelchair-bound Paraplegic For Medical Marijuana [Updated]

The federal government is so desperate to undermine New Mexico's new medical marijuana law, they've started arresting harassing handicapped people:
MALAGA, N.M. — Agents with a regional drug task force raided Leonard French’s home in southeastern New Mexico on Tuesday and seized several marijuana plants [Ed., it was actually just 6 seedlings]
But the wheelchair-bound man said he’s certified by the state Health Department to possess and smoke marijuana for medical reasons. The 44-year-old lost the use of his legs about 20 years ago as the result of a motorcycle crash and now suffers from chronic pain and muscle spasms. [Santa Fe New Mexican]
Normally, the DEA would avoid this kind of bad publicity. But since New Mexico's medical marijuana program just started, they're trying to intimidate patients and confuse legislators in other prospective medical marijuana states:
A press release jointly issued by the Pecos Valley Drug Task Force illustrates the political nature of the raid, reading in part, "Citizens of New Mexico need to be aware that they can still be prosecuted on the federal level even though New Mexico has a law permitting marijuana for medicinal use." [DPA]

Drug warriors keep arguing that medical marijuana laws create conflict between state and federal laws, but all they have to do is stop arresting threatening patients and there'd be no problem. They're creating confusion and then citing that confusion as an argument against state laws that protect patients. Meanwhile, sick people like Leonard French are caught in the crossfire, and countless other patients are afraid to try medicine that could help them.

Revealingly, Mr. French has not yet been charged with a crime. You see, DEA is tough enough to arrest wheelchair-bound medical marijuana patients, and even boast about its authority to continue doing so. All of that serves their interest in scaring people and creating doubt as more and more states pass laws to protect their citizens from precisely this sort of foul treatment. But they won't actually try to put him in jail because that would be just hideous.

So the real message here, for those reading between the lines, is that the feds aren't always going to enforce federal law. And that tells you everything you need to know about the debate over medical marijuana. This is all a big stupid publicity stunt, and while there are casualties to be sure (getting arrested and losing your medicine does suck), the whole "conflict with federal law" argument is largely a hoax.

Regardless, we cannot tolerate any federal efforts to scare people out of treating their illnesses with doctor recommended medicine that is legal in their state. That is obscene, and it's no surprise presidential candidates are lining up in opposition to it.

Update: My mistake. Leonard French wasn't taken into custody, so "arrested" was the wrong way to describe what happened to him. I've updated the post accordingly. It's important, because patients in New Mexico should understand that you're not in any great danger if you choose to participate in the medical marijuana program. I should have been more careful about this, because I certainly don't want to perpetuate these intimidation tactics. The fact that he wasn't even arrested is significant.

FOX News Discusses Drug Legalization

Those liberal hippies at FOX News are at it again. This segment featuring DPA's Ethan Nadelmann confronts drug prohibition head on.

It's a great clip with solid soundbites from Ethan and a neutral, almost vaguely sympathetic-sounding tone from the FOX correspondents (surely baked after a lunchbreak at the CNN offices). Bonus points go to ONDCP's David Murray for calling Ethan Nadelmann a "good friend," even though Murray keeps a collage of Nadelmann photos by his bedside with the words "Die Hippie" smeared across it in pig's blood.

August has been a strong month for the legalization argument. Cliff Shaffer's "Marijuana Dealers Offer Schwarzenegger One Billion Dollars" story took over the web, crashing our servers and generating national headlines. Misha Glenny's "The Lost War" from The Washington Post excited bloggers and even prompted an incredulous response from former ONDCP mouthpiece Robert Weiner. Now Ethan Nadelmann's cover story in Foreign Policy magazine is keeping the conversation going.

Earlier this week, Pete Guither and I lamented the difficulty of taking the reform argument to a mainstream audience. It's a challenge we'll continue to face, but the longer this brutal war continues without results, the better our chances get of being called on if we keep raising our hand. Our opposition is forever stuck claiming that drugs are the most destructive thing in the world, while also arguing that their brilliant drug control strategies are highly effective. It sounds sillier every time, and David Murray's recent decision to start calling himself a "scientist" is just one example of his office's deteriorating credibility. Discussion of drug legalization on FOX News is another.

"Marijuana Signature Project" Not as Cool as it Sounds

Watch out folks, the Marijuana Signature Project is not a legalization initiative. It's something far more sinister.

ONDCP's latest blog post, delightfully titled "Relying on Science to Craft Drug Policy," boasts of using our tax dollars to a finance a series of science experiments aimed at figuring out where marijuana is grown:
The drug control policy office is betting on stable isotopes to identify unique markers in marijuana, distinguishing it not just by geography but also by its cultivation method — for example, indoor versus outdoor.

"It’s an epidemiological and forensic public health investigation," said David Murray, chief scientist at the agency and director of its Counterdrug Technology Assessment Center. [NYTimes]
It is just hilarious that ONDCP is spending government funds to find out information that pot growers would gladly share if it wouldn't get them arrested. Dr. Murray, I know people that could tell you for free if your marijuana was grown indoors or out.

For an added touch of cuteness, here's the scientist behind the project feigning agnosticism about the marijuana debate:
Dr. West said his involvement in the project was not tied to any particular policy judgment. "I strongly believe that part of the picture in any policy development has to be the best possible science, and in cases where my work can contribute to that, I think that’s great," he wrote in an e-mail message.
Dr. West, you gullible dork, the point isn't to determine what our marijuana policy should be. They're trying to identify cultivation hotspots and send heavily armed narc-soldiers in there to slash and burn everything. If you're not trying to advance any "particular policy judgment," get the hell away from David Murray and stop collecting research grants from ONDCP.

Honestly, I'm hugely in favor of the feds wasting drug war dollars to discover that marijuana is grown basically anywhere you could think of. This ain't exactly drilling for oil. People grow pot wherever there aren’t a lot of drug cops around and make adjustments as necessary. It shouldn't take a laboratory in Salt Lake City to tell you this.

It is typical drug war hypocrisy that ONDCP sits around conducting forensic research, while they can't find so much as a gram to enable meaningful research into the drug's hotly contested medical applications.

Who Should Be the Next Drug Czar?

We will have a new president in January 2009, and that means we will have a new cabinet as well, including a new head of the Office of National Drug Control Policy (ONDCP--the drug czar's office). Who should the next drug czar be? Do we want another general? Another drug war true believer? (Would that be a job requirement?) A doctor? A public health person? A lawyer? An activist? A politician? The progressive web site The Backbone Campaign is seeking "shadow cabinet" nominations. Anyone can nominate anyone. Here's the list so far for the drug czar position:
Nominee(s): Ethan Nadelmann Dean Becker Tom Hayden Gary Johnson Rep. Maxine Waters Russell Simmons Bill Maher Al Sharpton Keith Stroup
I'd be happy with any of these folks, including our buddy Dean Becker from the Drug Truth Network. I'll also suggest a couple more: Professor Peter Reuter of the University of Maryland, co-author of "Drug War Heresies," knows drug policy issues inside and out and is a pretty progressive fellow on these issues. And, of course, in a perfect world, the next drug czar would be Tommy Chong. But I don't know if he could make it through the committee hearings... Who's your nominee?

D.C. Drug Policy Softball Team Ranked #1

Just when you thought reformers couldn’t play ball on Capitol Hill:

WASHINGTON, DC – The One Hitters, a softball team sponsored by Students for Sensible Drug Policy and the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws, took over the #1 ranking in the Congressional Softball League last night. The team’s 13-3 record has vaulted them to the top of the league, which is made up of Congressional offices, lobbying and consulting firms, non-profit organizations, and local businesses. [Dare Generation Diary]

With players from SSDP, MPP, NORML, and of course StopTheDrugWar.org, the One Hitters represent the athletic side of the drug policy reform movement. Opponents who arrive expecting clumsy Cheech & Chong antics get slaughtered and humiliated. It's been a while since the One Hitters surprised anyone, however, since they are now well known throughout the Congressional League for raising hell on the field.

The One Hitters garnered national media coverage two years ago when the Office of National Drug Control Policy started a team and promptly refused a face off. ONDCP's Tom Riley was not at his best attempting to explain why ONDCP was unwilling to challenge the "stoner" softball team:

"I wouldn't think we would play any team that promotes drug use," Riley said, adding, "that includes teams that promote smoking meth or smoking crack." [MAPinc]

A more likely explanation is that ONDCP heard rumors of a severe and inevitable beating if such a game were to take place, and now that the One Hitters have risen to the top of the league, it seems they made the right call. It's too bad though. A picture of sheepish ONDCP staffers sulking off the field would be worth a thousand blog posts.

Opposition to Medical Marijuana is a Conspiracy to Prevent Broader Legalization

An important fact to understand about the medical marijuana debate is that the federal government knows perfectly well that marijuana is an effective medicine:

*They've been providing it for decades to a select group of seriously ill patients, and continue to do so.
*They've approved a synthetic drug with the same active ingredient (THC).
*They commissioned a huge study in 1999, which explicitly said it works.
*They've been blocking research, which makes no sense if they think the results will favor them.

So the debate over medical marijuana isn't even about whether it has medical properties. It is about something else entirely, stated perfectly by ONDCP's Tom Riley just the other day:
"…a lot of the people who are behind this aren't really interested in sick people who need medicine, they're interested in marijuana legalization and they're playing on the suffering of genuinely sick people to get it." [Reuters]
As silly as it is, this argument explains everything there is to know about why the government actually opposes medical marijuana. Though countless mainstream medical, legal,  and religious organizations support medical marijuana, the federal government remains fixated on drug policy reformers and our role in defending the rights of patients.

The simple truth is that they are afraid that medical marijuana could lead to full-blown legalization of marijuana for recreational use. And it's not an irrational concern. If you're struggling to prevent accurate information about marijuana's effects from reaching the scientific community and the public, the last thing you want is a huge user population that can speak openly about their experiences with the drug.

Ironically, it is ONDCP's obsession with legalization that has turned medical marijuana into a great controversy, not ours. Similarly, it is ONDCP that exploits patients for political purposes, not us. Opposition to medical marijuana is not championed by doctors or scientists. It is funded and carried out by political operatives who want to keep marijuana illegal for everyone. That's the real medical marijuana conspiracy.

The People Support Medical Marijuana, Even If Congress Does Not

After retaining the right to arrest medical marijuana patients and caregivers, ONDCP's Tom Riley was unable to contain his glee:
Riley called the vote "a really tough day" for backers of the medical marijuana legislation.
…

"More and more people are realizing there is a con going on…" [Reuters]
This is just false on so many levels. For starters, we're gaining votes every year and we know more or less what to expect. Yesterday's result is not some sort of shocking rebuke of our position. If anything, Riley should be a bit concerned that 165 members of Congress think his whole team has its head up its collective posterior.

Similarly, Riley's assertion that "more and more people" are turning against medical marijuana is utter nonsense. We would have liked to get more votes, of course, but this is still the most support medical marijuana has seen in Congress. Public support for medical marijuana is far greater, hovering between 70% and 80%. Riley knows perfectly well that this issue is a full-blown public relations nightmare for his office, and he should be supremely grateful that idiocy about medical marijuana is better represented in Congress than the general population.

ONDCP's "Cocaine Shortage" Announcement is Pure Fiction

This week, the drug czar's office has tricked several newspapers into reporting on a so-called "cocaine shortage":
EL PASO — White House drug czar John Walters said wholesale prices of cocaine have risen in more than a dozen major U.S. cities as supplies of the powerful drug have shrunk, including in high-volume markets like Los Angeles and New York. [AP]
The irony, of course, is that there's no such thing as a cocaine shortage. Really, cocaine is probably the last thing we'll ever run out of in America, and if you think otherwise, maybe it's because people aren't telling you how much cocaine they've got.

Fortunately, Associated Press at least had the commonsense to ask an actual expert about the supposed shortage:
Peter Reuter, a public policy professor at the University of Maryland who studies illicit drugs and organized crime, said prices of cocaine have long been declining and that brief price surges are not uncommon. He said gauging the future of the cocaine trade after just a few months is difficult.

"We see short term (price) increases that go on for three, or six months even," Reuter said. "They don't tend to be too long, and then the downward trend continues."
One could praise AP for including Reuter's comments, but I won't. If AP's Alicia Caldwell actually listened to what he said, she'd understand that the story isn’t accurate enough to be worth writing. Moreover, Reuter's revealing analysis -- which renders the entire report meaningless –- is relegated to the bowels of the article. The fact that cocaine prices have continually gone down for decades is treated as an afterthought, a mere side note, in a story that otherwise regurgitates ONDCP's claims about the effectiveness of its own work.

Distinguished members of the press, I beg you once again: whenever the Office of National Drug Control Policy approaches you and offers to describe how well the drug war is going, just look around. Has anything changed? It shouldn’t even be necessary to ask Peter Reuter if their claims make sense. The idea that we're experiencing a cocaine shortage is so plainly ridiculous, I don't see how anyone could report such a thing with a straight face.

I'm reminded of real journalist Ken Silverstein's recent comment about his colleagues in the press:
As a class, they honor politeness over honesty and believe that being "balanced" means giving the same weight to a lie as you give to the truth.
How true -- and depressing – that is.

Even Anti-Meth Activists Oppose the Drug War

Tom Siebel is a multimillionaire philanthropist who funded terrifying anti-meth ads in Montana. His work has been praised by ONDCP, but now he's speaking out against the drug war.

The nation's drug policy "is a little bit crazy," Montana Meth Project founder Tom Siebel said Thursday.
...
Pointing out that the skyrocketing rate of incarceration is mostly because of drug offenses, Siebel said, "it used to be that we put people in jail who we were scared of. Now we put people in jail we're mad at."

Prison doesn't work, he said.

"They just get a better education," Siebel added. "It's like a graduate school program in drug distribution." [Great Falls Tribune]

Tom Siebel absolutely hates meth, and yet he also opposes the drug war. How can this be? Maybe his aggressive anti-meth ads are actually some sort of drug legalization conspiracy, because everyone knows that only "pro-drug groups" would ever criticize the wisdom of trying to arrest our way out of the drug problem.

Of course, Tom Siebel's work and his words demonstrate that people who care about victims of drug addiction can simultaneously oppose drug abuse while advocating commonsense policies that emphasize public health and reject mass incarceration. Having previously heaped praise upon Tom Siebel, will ONDCP now accuse him of being "pro-drug"?

Regardless, it is becoming increasingly obvious that ONDCP couldn't alienate anti-drug activists, the U.S. Congress, and the academic community any faster if they were actually doing speed themselves.

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